WHAT FOREIGN POLICY?

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000403040011-2
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 26, 2012
• Sequence Number: 11
• Publication Date: September 14, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

ARTIC~ a eox~oiri
~ ~ Declassified and Approved For Releas H~012~01i UN~ Y 5RDP90-009658000403040011-2
14 September 1986
r ~ ~
at Forei n P
olic .
g
From Libyrx to D~aniloff, Reagan's Ad-Hoc Approach Is Hokum
B ~ . Reagan's ad-hociem has its vir- Rea an' f t
s
t
a ra a to pu
e
p
ug an hts old frtend.
free Nicholas Daniloff. Offi- When public support eroded for
irs reac
ion to the So-
y vtd Ignsttua toes. When Ferdinand ~~ ~ g
came ~ ~~ ~ ~ viet attack was low-key, Hersh
HE REAGAN administration United States this writes: "Reagan felt no immediate
T hasn't ruled out t d ~ ~' ~~? need to denounce the Soviets or in
ll
d
l
vials hope the Daniloff case won't M~erican invdvernent in Lebanon
disrupt arms-control talks or the in 1984. Reagan bailed out. It's
summit. Oops, Wait a minute. hard to imagine this president get.
Scratch that. The Daniloff case is ling involved in a messy, unpopular
an affront to human decency. There war like Vietnam. He wouldn't have
can be no talk of a trade for Dan- the patience for it. And Reagan has
doff. Er, sorry Did we say no trade? accanplished the sleight of hand
Perhaps an "interim" trade is ac- that matters mast in foreign affairs;
cepcabk. the appearance of strength.
Libya's Moammar Gadhafi. is The problem is that the undisci-
planning new terrorist attacks pGtkd, ad-hoc style of the Reagan
against the United States, and the administration makes it hard to
Reagan administration is readying achieve any foreign-Rolicy break-
plans for a military retaliation. throughs. It's surprising, in fact,
Whoaa! Hold on. Correction. The hoa little this strong sad popular
administration isn't planning miG- president hes been able to accom-
t
i
ary act
on. InteWgence reports
about Libya are inconclusive.
President Reagan is finally pre-
pared fora "grand compromise" on
arms control. He will accept limit
on strategic defense in eschattge for
deep cuts in Soviet offensive mis-
siles. Wait. Sorry. No, he isn't. A
trade-off of Star Wars u out of the
question. The president remains
fully committed to SDL
These are the sounds of an ad-
ministration spinning its wheels on
foreign policy. Indeed, after review-
ing the past month's record of
statements and retractions on key
issues, a reasonable person might
ask whether the administration is
conducting a foreign policy at all
these days. The answer is yes, but
it's a strange sort of policy.
The Reagan administration's for-
eign policy might best be described
as "ad-hocism." Far from being the
rigid applicatlen of ideology that
liberal critip feared, the Reagan
foreign policy has proved to be
something quite different: an ad-hoc
process?vf trial and error, of alter-
nating hard-Wx and soft-line state-
ments. of proposals that are run up
the flagpole to see wbo salutes.
It i8 foreign polic~i by public-opin-
ion poll, and in many ways, it works.
The country is happy. UsuaAy it
gets what it Wants.
push in nearly sat years, The record
of the weak and unpopular Carter
administration, by comparison, is
full of accomplishments, whether
you agree with them or not: the
Panama Canal treaty, normalization
of diplomatic relations with China, a
new SALT treaty with the Soviet
Union, a peace treaty between
Egypt and Israel. The Reagan ad-
ministration, >o contrast, has had
trouble brokering a relatively sim-
ple dispute between Egypt and Is-
rael about some beach property in
the Sinai desert.
The root of these difficulties is
the breakdown of the National Se-
curity Council system. The NSC is
supposed to bring order to the pol-
icy process and ensure that the ad-
ministration speaks with one voice.
But in this administration, the NSC
machine hasn't worked to resolve
interagency bickering and provide
clear and timely presidential deci-
sions.
case in point is the Reagan
administration's perform-
ance during the 1983 shoot-
down of Korean Air Lines Flight
007. As Seymour Hersh recon-
structs the story in his new book,
'"fhe Tsrget Is Destroyed," the ad-
ministration had difficulty speaking
with one voice in the first hours and
days after the incident.
some other way to seek vengeance
.... He didn't have to prove that he
could stand up to the Soviets."
This initial bw-key response soon
gave way to a cacophony of aides and
bureaucrats expressing indignation
and urging reprisals. The president
eventually decided to turn up the
rhetoric. He denounced the Soviets
for deliberately shooting down the
plane (even though U.S. intelligence
reports questioned whether the So-
viets had realized it was a civilian
airliner) and said that the Soviet ac-
tion was worse than their 19?9 in-
vasion of Afghanistan. But Reagaa
didn't retaliate. Tbia combination of
red-twt rhetoric and no mi4tarp risk.
seemed to suit the public mood:
A similar pattern of changing
statements and ad-hoc policy has
been evident in the foreign-policy
crises of the past month. Consider.
^ The D~axiloJ/ cane. Two days after
the KGB seized the American jour- .
naGst in Moscow, White House of-
ficialssaid the Reagan administration
hadn't ruled out the possibility of an
exchange to win Datriloff's freedom.
The officials added that the admin-
istration hoped to avoid an interna-
tional incident and disruption of
arms-control talks, which were ap-
proaching asensitive phase, or the
prospective summit between Reagan
and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorba-
chev.
Four days later, amid growing
public indignation about Daniloff, the
line seemed to change. Secretary of
State George Shultz said in a speech
at Harvard: "Let there be no talk of a
trade for Daniloff ....The Soviet
leadership must find the wisdom to
settle tie case quickly in acoocdance
with the dictates of simple human'
decency and of civilized national be-
havior." Then, last Friday, the hard
line seemed to soften as American.
officials negotiated the "interim" re?
lease of Daniloff and an accused So-
viet spy to the custody of their re-~
spective ambassadors.
Cac~anue0
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/01/26 :CIA-RDP90-009658000403040011-2
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/01/26 :CIA-RDP90-009658000403040011-2
? Arms Control: Reagan sent a
letter in July to Gorbachev that many
administration officials described as a
breakthrough on arms control They.
told reporters that Reagan was final-,
ly prepared to accept limitations on
testing and depbyment of defensivz
weapons as part of a new arms tort`
trot agreement.
Not so, claimed Secretary of De-~
fense Caspar Weinberger last week.
He asserted during a lunch meeting.
with journalists that Reagan hadn't
agreed to any such "grand compro?
miss." He maintained: '"Che grand
compromise was more in the minder
of certain behokkrs than anything
else. It was never something the
president considered because he waa
never willing to give up strategic
defense."
Who's right? Those like Weinber-
ger who insist that the president will'
never give up SDL~ Or the senia
administration officials who maintain
that the president deeply wants an
arms-control agreement with Mos-
cow? Both are probably right. Our
ad-hoc president wants both things.
and apparently feels he doesn't have
to choose between them.
^ Libya. The Wall Street Journal
created an uproar last month when it
reported: "After a lull, Col. Gadhafi
has begun plotting new terrorist at-.
tacks .. , .And the Reagan admin-
istration is preparing to teach the
mercurial Libyan leader another les-
son. Right now, the Pentagon is com-
pleting plans for a new and larger
bombing of Libya in case the pres-
ident orders it."
Oh yeah? Administration officialsc
in Washington told The New York
Times that "the United States had no
hard evidence that Libya was plan=
ning new terrorist attacks and they+
flatly denied reports of impending
military action against Libya.' Ob
Yeah? A senior White House o~iat
in Santa Barbara told repoRers for
Joucrud stay waa "highly autharita~
five." Oh yeah? Otltcr official slid
the adminaaation had in fact bees
caught m a partiarlarly inept psycho-
lo6ical warfare scheme, one that
seemed to frighten the American
public more than it did Gadhafi.
The Reagan administration's
foreign-policy pr~lems stem
from the inability of the Rea-
gan NSC to speak clearly and ooher~
ently during crises. Ultimately the
incoherence reflects Reagan s ov~
failure to control the policy ~~~
or to fmd a national security
who can do the dirty work for him.:
Seymour Hersh, certainly no f~ri
of Henry Kissinger. argues that tt~
former national security advises
could teach the Reaganites an impoi~
tant lesson. Says Hersh: "Kisaingb!
understood that you have to grab
control of communications in tlt~
White House and spear with ooh
voice." ;
Hasid ~tisw att a~taiate editor
of Tl~s WaaMi~ Pb~ is tAe
edito-ojtitis Owtloort ~+ettorr.
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/01/26 :CIA-RDP90-009658000403040011-2